The prior art discloses various methods and concepts by which patients who have undergone amputations, e.g. of the lower extremities, are fitted with a prosthesis. In patients whose legs have been amputated above or below the knee or through the knee joint, a classical method for producing a prosthesis socket is the plaster cast method, in which a plaster cast is made of a patient's amputation stump and serves as a template for a stump model, and a prosthesis socket, for example a thigh socket, is formed on this stump model. This thigh socket is made from a plastic and completely surrounds the amputation stump.
Various concepts have been proposed for securing the thigh socket to the stump. For example, a liner is pulled over the amputation stump and bears sealingly on the outside on the socket. The air is removed from the space between the liner and the outer socket by way of a release valve or a pump, such that the prosthesis socket is held on the amputation stump of the patient by means of underpressure. In the case of a release valve, the air taken is released at each step, and active evacuation does not take place. In the case of a pin solution, the end of the liner is provided with a projection that is locked in the socket. Further prosthesis devices are then arranged on the prosthesis socket itself, for example prosthetic knee joints and additional devices such as a connecting element and prosthetic foot.
Adapting prosthesis socket individually to the amputation stump is extremely difficult and time-consuming and has to be done by a trained orthopedic technician. Several fittings are needed in order to individually adapt the prosthesis socket, with the result that nine to twelve months may pass between the operation and the final provision of an adapted prosthesis socket. These prosthesis sockets ensure a high degree of stability and activity of the prosthesis user. Patients with an amputation of an upper extremity are treated in a comparable manner.
However, the patients who are to be provided with prosthesis devices do not all have the same requirement for extensive mobility. For example, elderly subjects who are suffering from diabetes, and who have had to have parts of the lower extremities amputated on account of gangrene induced by diabetes, are often unable to walk long distances. In addition, there are considerable fluctuations in the volume of the amputation stump, such that a correct adaptation of the prosthesis socket to the stump is possible only with difficulty. Moreover, the patient is often unable to cooperate actively in the adaptation of the prosthesis socket. However, it is particularly important for these very patients to be fitted with a prosthesis as soon as possible in order to be able to minimize the period of confinement to bed. When treating the upper extremities, it is also important to adapt a prosthesis as quickly as possible in order to ensure that motor capacity is not lost.
EP 1 656 911 A1 describes a prosthesis socket with a closed shell and with an element which is arranged laterally therein and which is pulled in the direction of the stump via a tensioning strap that is guided into the shell through two slits. The bottom of the shell is padded and has connecting means for a lower leg.
DE 32 29 812 A1 relates to a stump-receiving shell for an artificial limb, with at least one shell which has a curved, open cross section and of which the ends at least partially overlap each other in the state when applied. Tensioning means arranged on the shell act in the circumferential direction and clamp the shell ends on each other.